大象传媒

This story was submitted by Valerie Gates via Stratford Library.

Extract from a letter received before my cousin died in January 2004. His name was Dennis Rose and he was in the 1st Army in Tunisia and Italy:

"It was really knocked about, everywhere apart from Tunis where there was no opposition. The Germans had gone. After Tunis we travelled along the coast to Hamnet (?Hammamet) where we met thousands of Germans - they were in a terrible state, really fed up, hungry, thirsty and wanted a smoke. There were several times when it was scary, once when we were torpedoed on the way out, and three terrible battles, Medjez el Bab, Kairouan Pass and Kasserine.

Medjez el Bab was the worst of all where we lost 25 tanks and a lot of men, having to go back to Le Kef to re-equip for 2 weeks. I was lucky really - I only drove trucks with ammunition and petrol. The tanks in Italy were diesel and didn't blow up so easily. When we first went out English tanks would only travel at 12mph but American tanks would do 30.

We did have some good times in Italy apart from Cassino. 3 months in Florence owing to the weather. I drove the Colonel there with a lovely Humber estate. Then when it was all over we had 9 months in Milan - Garrison troops. Plenty of fun there - a smashing place."

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.